University of Maryland, Division of Information TechnologyA Guide to Using Social Media Effectively—IT Help Desk

2015—2016

TweetDeck: A tool that allows Twitter users to monitor news, organize and schedule tweets, and track engagement.

Step 1: Go to https://tweetdeck.twitter.com.

Step 2: Log-in with Twitter username and password.

Step 3: Click on “Add a Column” on the left-hand side. The following menu should appear. “Search,” “Notifications,” “Mentions,” “Messages,” “Collections,” and “Scheduled” should be used.

For Monitoring/Responding to Tweets

Search This tool is perfect for searching tweets that have certain key words. Rather than repeating searches every time, this tool saves your searches and creates a column that continuously collects tweets with only those key words.

To create a column with a key search like “UMD Wifi:”

Step 1: Click on “Search.”

Step 2: Type in “UMD Wifi.” Hit “Enter.” A dialog box should appear. You can narrow your searches to tweets that are only in English by clicking on

“Content,” and change the setting from “Written in any language” to “Written in English.” Click “Add Column.” Additionally, you can exclude key words to make sure that you’re only getting tweets that are related to the University of Maryland. Click “Content” and next to “Excluding,” type in a word that you want to exclude.

You can do this with other key searches and have multiple columns collecting tweets.

The “Search” tool can help the IT Help Desk promptly respond to people’s questions and concerns.

Some suggested key words: “UMD wifi,” “UMD Internet,” “UMD terpware,” “UMD tech,” “UMD password,” “UMD,” “UMD laptop,” and “UMD Microsoft.”

When responding to tweets, you mention the user with the @ character key preceding their username. If you want to make the response public, put a period in front of the @ character

key that precedes their username. Example: “.@UofMaryland Hi!”

Notifications This tool helps you track engagement with your account. It notifies you if someone has favorited, retweeted, mentioned or followed your account. You can create a column for “Notifications” by going to “Add Column” and click “Notifications.”

To customize notifications:

Step 1: Go to the grid-like icon located at the top right of the “Notifications” column.

Step 2: Click on “All notifications.”

Step 3: Choose what kind of notification you would like the account to receive.

The “Notifications” tool, if set to only “Mentions,” can help the IT Help Desk respond to questions and concerns that are directed at the IT Help Desk.

However, there is already a “Mentions” tool that you can create as a column.

MessagesThis tool allows you to send private messages to another user’s account. This can be useful for the IT Help Desk to address IT-related problems that require more than 140 characters. You can create a column for “Messages” by going to “Add Column” and clicking “Messages.”

To compose a message:

Step 1: Click on the first icon located to the right of “Messages.”

Step 2: A box dialog shouldappear. Enter the username you would like to send themessage to and compose themessage.

Step 1

Twitter can automatically enter the username into the recipient box if you expand a tweet that a user posted and click on “Send a Direct Message.”

For Social Media Monitoring Reports

CollectionsThis tool is perfect for curating all tweets into one column. You can make multiple collections.

To make a collection:

Step 1: Click on “Create a Collection.”

Step 2: You can label the collection and add a description.

Step 3: To add tweets to the collection, you can drag a tweet from other columns or expand a tweet and click “Add to Collection.”

You can print out the tweets for records by expanding the “Collections” column and clicking “Share.” From there, you’re given three options. Click on “View on twitter.com.” You’ll be taken to the regular Twitter page with your collection of tweets. From there, you can choose to print or screenshot the tweets to be put onto a Word file.

To Make and Schedule Tweets

This is probably the most important, useful tool in TweetDeck. Rather than making sure that you’re on Twitter twice every weekday, you can create tweets one day of the week and schedule for when they should be posted for the rest of the week. Or month. This guarantees content for followers and ensures engagement.

To schedule a tweet:

Step 1: Click on “New Tweet” on the left-hand side.

Step 2: Create a tweet.

Step 3: Click on “Schedule Tweet.” Choose a date and time for that tweet to be published.

Step 4: Go to “Add Column” and click on “Scheduled Tweets” to view tweets that you’ve created. You can see each tweet with its set published date/time and determine if you want to edit or delete it before it goes public. Tweets will be published regardless if you’re logged onto the account.

Composing Tweets for the IT Help DeskIt’s important to create tweets that coincide with the account’s key messages, so that followers do not get confused with how they should interact with the account.

Key messages of the IT Help Desk: The IT Help Desk is available to provide real-time help to those who suffer IT-related

problems e.g. Wi-Fi, program downloads, etc. The IT Help Desk’s social media platforms are sources of help for concerns that do not

require a phone call. The IT Help Desk provides up-to-date information on products and services. For

example, the date of the end of support for certain products.

Because the IT Help Desk will be providing customer service through social media, it should have a consistent tone when handling problems. This tone should be professional and positive.

Example:

A few appropriate responses: “.@leeeel_ Hi, anything we can help with?”

“.@leeel_ Hi, are you in an area that’s very crowded?”

“.@leeel_ Hi, could you tell us where you’re located right now so we can address the problem?”

Example:

A few appropriate responses: “.@Cpav15 Hi, you can change your password online by going to

directory.umd.edu/password

“.@Cpav15 Hi, you should have been notified thru email 10 days before your password expires. But you can go to directory.umd.edu/password to change it any time!”